ABSTRACT
This chapter explains the roles and function of advertising, sales promotion, publicity and public relations (PR), in communicating information to influence the actions of target audiences. Most marketing managers possess a good deal of implicit knowledge about persuasive communications, as such knowledge is a necessary part of social living, whether in business or society at large. Communication is the transfer of message meanings, feelings, and tones from one person or group to another. In their persuasive communications, marketers seek to transfer a set of meanings, feelings, and tones about a product to some target audience so that the audience's perceptions of the product mirror those that they want to convey. Hershey, the US chocolate firm, did not advertise for years until Cadbury and other European firms entered the market. Another example is the Scoresby brand of Scotch which became, without advertising, the fifth largest brand of Scotch in the United States, though it now does advertise.
